


Work of Art

by veryvincible



Category: Marvel (Comics), Marvel 616
Genre: Alternate Universe - Creatures & Monsters, Anal Sex, Dumbass Steve Rogers, Dumbass Tony Stark, Halloween, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, Misunderstandings, Mutual Pining, Oblivious Steve Rogers, Pining Steve Rogers, Vampire Tony Stark, Werewolf Steve Rogers, happy halloween everyone, it's cute i promise
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-01
Updated: 2020-11-01
Packaged: 2021-03-09 02:27:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,656
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27317005
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/veryvincible/pseuds/veryvincible
Summary: Tony smelled… off. Wrong. He smelled strange in a way that would justify the cold, Steve thought. There was a metallic layer to blood that Steve was used to smelling, and in Tony, that was distinctly not present.So, Steve concluded, Tony must have had an iron deficiency. Something to that effect, at least. He became faint without warning, he was chilly as the dead, and he was as pale as any man Steve had ever seen.-Tony Stark is a vampire. It's common knowledge, at this point.Somehow, Steve isn't aware of that little fact.
Relationships: Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
Comments: 37
Kudos: 319





	Work of Art

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Welcoming_Disaster](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Welcoming_Disaster/gifts).



> Happy Halloween, my dear.  
> If you've been some kind of supernatural entity all this time, now would be a hilarious time to let me know.

“May I be invited in?”

Tony Stark’s voice followed two muted knocks on the doorway of Steve’s bedroom. Steve, sitting quite contentedly at his desk, raised his head from the book he’d been reading ( _Dracula,_ it was- a nice, familiar reread).

Tony Stark said things like that. _May I be invited in?_ and _Am I welcome to enter?_ and sometimes, cheekily, _Don’t be shy, Steve, ask for my company._

He was polite, Steve thought, in a strange sort of way. He clearly didn’t expect people to be so polite in return; the one time Steve himself asked, “May I be invited in?” as he stood in the doorway of Tony’s laboratory in the dead of night, Tony gave him a funny look, almost as if he wasn’t sure what to make of the question. If Steve didn’t know better, he’d even say Tony looked taken aback.

But he did know better. Tony was thrown off by someone matching his level, Steve knew. Tony was an open book, especially with Steve. They were the best of friends, after all, and Steve thought there was very little Tony could bear to hide from him.

“Of course,” Steve answered. Tony lingered in the doorway for a moment more, and Steve added, “Come in.”

It was then that Tony entered, strange as usual. Steve felt he properly embodied the “eccentric billionaire” archetype, with a dash of “mad scientist.” His hair stuck up in funny ways during the day as if he’d just woken up, and that may have been the case; his sleep schedule certainly wasn’t aligned with that of any other human Steve had met before. He was the owner of his company, though, and that must have meant he could set whatever schedule he desired. He could nap at any and all hours of the day, leaving the night for his work and his tinkering (which Steve could hear quite clearly from his bedroom, as he himself was an enhanced individual, a werewolf born of experimentation, and the walls hadn’t been soundproofed).

Steve heard quite a bit through the night. He had half the mind to ask Tony to quiet down in the beginning, but as the months passed, he found comfort in the tinkering, the footsteps, and even the occasional flickering of candlelight illuminating the gap underneath his doorway as Tony made his way through the halls of the mansion.

With time, he came to listen for them, closing his eyes but refraining from dozing off until he heard those familiar sounds that served as confirmation that Tony was alive and well.

Tony’s sleep schedule didn’t affect the job he did with the Avengers. He was there when needed, effective as anything. Steve supposed he must have been the same with his business. It was a comfort for him and Tony both, it seemed- a quiet, unspoken comfort on his part.

“I was just preparing for a walk,” Tony explained, walking over to meet Steve at his desk. He left his umbrella (black, with a lace trim) against the doorway. The low, stiff heels of his shoes clacked against the dark hardwood floor that dressed every bedroom in the mansion. Tony held his hand out for Steve’s book curiously, and Steve handed it over with no fuss. Tony’s finger (dressed in a white glove alongside the rest of his hands) lightly traced along the edges of it, his gaze fluttering over the cover with a twinkle that perplexed Steve.

_He must like the book,_ Steve thought to himself. _Surely, he’s read it._

“I was wondering if you’d be willing to join me,” Tony added, lining the book up with the wooden corner of the desk as he set it down. “It’s a nice day outside.”

And a nice day it was. Though it was mid-October, the weather wasn’t so cool that one would feel obligated to layer up if they didn’t want to-- no one average, at least. Steve didn’t need much to keep warm, but he knew Tony ran cold. There would be times when they’d reach for the same mug in the kitchen and their hands would brush, and Tony’s skin was so cold to the touch that Steve might have thought him a corpse under different circumstances.

Steve made a habit of checking up on Tony. Those same enhanced senses that allowed him to hear Tony’s tinkering all hours of the night also enabled him to smell quite well; he could sense variations in blood, though he wasn’t practiced nor educated enough to be able to pin down exactly what might be wrong with it. He wasn’t a _doctor_ , he was merely a hound of a man.

Tony smelled… off. Wrong. He smelled strange in a way that would justify the cold, Steve thought. There was a metallic layer to blood that Steve was used to smelling, and in Tony, that was distinctly _not present._

So, Steve concluded, Tony must have had an iron deficiency. Something to that effect, at least. He became faint without warning, he was chilly as the dead, and he was as pale as any man Steve had ever seen.

_“They have iron supplements out there, don’t they?”_ Steve had asked him once, earlier on in their friendship.

_“Excuse me?”_ Steve clearly remembered a tinge of discomfort in Tony’s voice, as if a boundary had been crossed. Steve could understand why; he realized in the moment that he’d commented on Tony’s medical history without warning, and perhaps they weren’t quite close enough yet to feel concern for each other in that way.

_“I’m sorry,”_ Steve corrected himself, though he was in too deep to ignore it completely. _“You just seem to be ill so often. It’s concerning sometimes.”_

_“Regrettably,”_ Tony had said to him, a bite in his voice unlike anything Steve had heard before, like he was speaking to a cruel adversary post-attack and not a close friend of his, _“there’s no substitute for a balanced diet.”_

_Well, yes,_ Steve remembered thinking to himself. _But I don’t ever see you eating one. Have some fish, Tony. You never eat fish._

He didn’t say that bit out loud.

Tony barely ate at all, from what Steve could see. He didn’t smell food in the night, either, so Tony must have been eating milder foods. He had specific dietary restrictions when he ate with the team (which was a rarity in and of itself): no garlic, no silverware, and, if it could be helped, nothing too pungent (garlic, he supposed, was especially pungent). Eccentric, indeed.

Steve didn’t feel the need to comment on those strange little things, either. Especially not then.

Tony was frustrated enough with him, clearly, as if Steve had been attacking him directly. He didn’t speak to Steve for some hours. Steve couldn’t help but feel a dog-like sense of heartbreak when someone he thought himself so loyal to chose to neglect him, even when the action was so temporary and so perfectly justified.

And it was perfectly justified, and as temporary as any temporary thing could be. He gave Tony space, and Tony eventually got past the little crossing of boundaries. Steve was glad; they were better together. 

All that to say.

Steve thought Tony might get cold outside.

“I’ll walk with you,” Steve said, getting up from his desk to grab a coat from his closet. It was a hefty sort of thing, a thick black trench coat that _happened to remain stylish despite its utilitarian pocket-having,_ according to Tony. It did, indeed, have many pockets. Steve didn’t even have much use for so many.

Still, he liked to have them. It was nice to have pockets.

He held it out for Tony, who quirked a brow.

“I’m quite alright,” Tony said. He looked covered enough, but the materials draping from his body always seemed so weightless, so thin. He wore silk and velvet (both crushed and uncrushed), lace and other sheer fabrics, and altogether un-warm clothing that would do him no good in the Autumn cold.

That day, he happened to be wearing cotton; it was thin cotton, though, pliable and almost modern-looking despite the nigh Edwardian aesthetic Tony seemed to have adopted for himself. His dark black vest was patterned over a red dress shirt, a light tailcoat pulled over both. He wore a dark tie tucked into his vest, and- as mentioned- those bright white gloves made of what Steve could only imagine to be the finest fabric available. They clung to his skin so closely that Steve was sure he could draw Tony’s naked hands even then, and yet there was a pleasant ruffle at the wrists where the fabric bunched together, the edges pushed closer to the base of his hand by the cuff of his coat.

_Flawless,_ Steve thought, and it was more a fact of life than a compliment or acknowledgement of desire. _Flawless,_ Steve thought, and he thought everyone thought the same when they looked at Tony, whose skin was clear and fair and soft. His cheekbones were sunken in a way that would befit a corpse, though he somehow managed to look the most lively out of anyone on the team. His eyes were light (almost white), his gaze piercing, and his lips were red in a way that looked both natural and painted on, as if he were a work of art walking alongside all the average Joe’s in the world.

“It’s 50 degrees out,” Steve argued still. He’d give up any opportunity to admire Tony’s figure for the sake of Tony’s comfort.

He’d give anything for Tony to feel warm.

“Really, Steve.” Tony reached for his umbrella as he approached the doorway, checking over his shoulder to make sure he was being followed. “I’ll be alright.”

Steve didn’t push it. He simply slipped the coat on himself, though he knew he didn’t need so much warmth. If Tony needed it, Steve would have it on hand.

And so they set off together.

Tony used his umbrella quite like a cane at times, though Steve wasn’t entirely sure why. He assumed it might have been related to the fatigue, which might have been related to the iron deficiency, which might have been related to his diet. But Steve didn’t want to comment on his diet- again, Tony was rather touchy about it, for reasons unknown to him- so he simply allowed Tony his space and his comfort.

It added to the pleasant clicking of Tony’s heels on the hardwood floor. The cane-umbrella would fall on its own rhythm, connected to Tony’s footsteps but not restricted by them. It was repetitive but not incredibly so, and Steve found himself listening closely, searching for the little off-beat taps that resembled the sound of Tony’s tinkering that could lull him to sleep.

Walking through the mansion alone could be considered a “walk,” Steve thought. It was a large place, and the rooms were all localized on one side of it. There were a handful of exits dotted around, but Tony always made a show of using the front door. It was grandiose and almost ill-fitting, as if it was built separately from the rest of the building and tacked on at the end. Most of the walls, the counters, and floors- the chairs and tables, even- were made of a dark brown wood with reddish undertones. The front doors, though, were almost cherry. Its accents were gold, spreading upward from the bottom corners as if creeping up the sides like vines.

It was easy to spot, even from afar.

Tony made no effort to quicken his pace to reach it.

The architecture of the mansion was distinctly familiar. It was something Steve thought might have been built in his childhood. Wrought iron wrapped around the staircase lovingly, the windows gorgeously arched. There were areas that seemed as if they were intended to be minimalistic in a traditional sense, but Tony wasn’t one to leave much space on the walls. They were covered in photos, in portraits and paintings.

His bookshelves were filled to the brim, mostly with titles that Steve recognized (or thought he might be able to recognize based on timeline alone, even if he hadn’t read them himself). There were little trinkets strewn about every available surface. Some pieces of decoration seemed outdated for the home but not ill-fitting; Tony must have been a collector. He had the money and the interest to pour his time into antiquing, Steve supposed.

The place was quirky in a homely way. It was cluttered in an organized manner, every mismatched painting beside the others in a melted asymmetrical grid on the walls. Eclectic suits of armor that would never have encountered the others in life stood opposite each other in hallways, some occupying corners as well. There was no way to escape the feeling of being watched in the public areas of the mansion as a result, but Steve found he didn’t mind it so much. It was nice to be looked out for. Perhaps he’d imbued the mansion with its own personality long ago, something caring and lovely, and found himself comfortable being enveloped in its warmth.

That was the kind of warmth he wanted for Tony, outside of literal terms. The kind of warmth you could wrap yourself up in. The kind of warmth that made you feel at home.

Steve pushed open the cherry front doors once they reached them, allowing Tony time to open his umbrella and rest it upon his shoulder before continuing outside. He was frightened of wrinkling, clearly, or any signs of aging. Or perhaps it was a matter of pigmentation, and there were spots that only worsened in the sunlight, spots that Steve would never see due to Tony’s meticulous plan to keep his skin preserved well. It could just as easily have been a fear attributed to the paleness of his skin on its own. Burns were never pleasant, and maybe Tony in particular had some specific and exaggerated aversion to them.

Steve thought he might have liked to comment on the undertones of Tony’s hair in the light or the shine of his eyes outside (perhaps even the sun-kissed pinkness across his nose and cheeks if he was blessed enough), but the umbrella’s shade was cast over the entirety of his face, and Steve was left to speculate.

_… the jet black of his hair had no give even in the brightest of lights, seemingly a space devoid of color entirely in such a way that his pale face contrasted almost to the point of being uncanny. His irises, so close to blank and so pale already, seemed to disappear into the whites of his eyes as his pupils shrank to accommodate the sunlight. His unnaturally red lips glistened as he wet them with his tongue to remoisturize them as the cold dehydrated him. And his skin, pale- paler than mine (which at times looked ill-fitting, as if the angel responsible for brushing the beige onto him made a mistake in its color mixing or skipped the step altogether), was pinkish and a little flaky even in the Autumn, and he’d wince each time he pressed a napkin to his face at mealtime in the days following. He’d complain about it harmlessly, endlessly moaning about what a mistake it was to ever go out to begin with. He’d take me by the wrist and tug me outdoors once again, though, as we both knew well that sunburn in kind and homely memories was preferable to lonesome flawlessness…_

And speculate he did, it seemed.

He looked at Tony- the real Tony, standing in front of him with his face covered in shade and his skin light as ever- and Tony looked back, and they shared a smile.

Tony was flawless, yes. But lonesome, he seemed not to be.

  
Steve hoped that was the case, at least.

* * *

They spent time together like that often. They’d go on walks, or they’d sit in a common area together and read (or work, when Tony had work to do, and Tony very often had work to do). It happened that they sought each other out more often than not- more often, Steve thought, than any other members of the team did with each other.

It was a running joke for them.

_Mom,_ they’d call Tony. _Dad,_ they’d call Steve. It was sickeningly sweet and horribly endearing, especially when Peter came around with his many heads and many fuzzy arms, gazing upon Steve and Tony with many eyes and saying (with many mouths, of course), “Mom and Dad are fighting over the remote again.”

Sam would laugh-squawk, feathers ruffling loose of his shaking shoulders as he did so. Jan’s giggles were light as air, seeming to float on wings as easily as she did. Everyone on the team had something to say about them; all the jokes were recycled or, at the very least, along the same vein as one another. So it wasn’t an uncommon occurrence for Steve or Tony to be in company with a friend and, when the other entered, the friend would exclaim in jest that they mistakenly thought they’d get to have time alone with one of the pair for once.

It was sweet. Steve thought it was sweet, at least, as it was none too overwhelming when the jokes would be laughed at and forgotten in the span of seconds, and their respective times away from each other would be carefully and respectfully preserved.

That wasn’t quite the case at team events, though.

That night specifically was October 31st- Halloween night, as everyone knew- and the mansion was filled with friendly faces, both human and otherwise. Steve hesitated to call Tony a “party animal,” but he certainly was a more-than-decent host. Tables of food spread so far across the ballroom floor that Steve thought individual desserts alone might outnumber guests, and the music that played seemed to filter through every room equally, never leaving one’s side.

Plenty of people were drinking. Tony used to, at these parties- he still did at times, but he seemed less inclined to do so the more crowded the mansion got- and it worried Steve how little it took for Tony to become totally and shockingly soused. It wasn’t quite Steve’s preference, but he was willing to have a glass of champagne to nurse slowly as he made his way from group to group, checking in on loved ones and greeting old friends. His sips were small and reluctant, but if nothing else, it was something to do with his hands.

He wasn’t one for bold costumes, and it was clear enough in the way he’d been dressed for the party that his input mattered little when it came to the final result. Jan had dressed him in a loose pair of slacks, some casual slippers, and a fancy red robe as if he were a Casanova. He’d had a prop pipe hanging from between his lips near the beginning of the party, but it had been stuffed into his pocket ever since he made friends with the mozzarella sticks on one end of the buffet table. He wouldn’t say he “stuffed his face” with them, but in all fairness, he wouldn’t say he’d dress like a Casanova, either. Yet, there he was.

His eyes scanned the room as he brushed the bread crumbs off of his hands and onto his slacks. He wasn’t quite so overstimulated- not like he was in the beginning, at least, before Tony took notice of his discomfort and took steps to make everything easier to handle for him. It was a touching and not-too-invasive gesture; he’d ask people to keep yelling to a minimum and, if they were to sing and dance, do it with tact. Sure, there was a wild quality to the parties that had been diluted to some degree, but no one minded enough to break the rules, and everyone seemed to have a more relaxed (and more memorable, for some) time for it. It was still quite a lot to look at, but Steve figured he could manage that on his own.

When his eyes landed on Tony, he approached. He always did. Tony was an alluring man, and even if he hadn’t been, Steve could still think of no one better to seek out for a break from the crowd.

Tony was clad in a cheap-looking Dracula costume, one that might have been purchased from a pop-up Halloween store, and the thought behind the action was as heartwarming as it was hilarious. Steve could imagine him strolling on by in his expensive, already vampiric-adjacent clothing, seeing those funny boots and that shiny cape, and going, “You know what I’ll do this Halloween?”

Steve strode confidently up to him, more comfortable now in his own silly costume. Carol had just left Tony’s side, so Tony was available to speak as he pleased, and his face brightened when his eyes landed on Steve.

“Hey,” he greeted. “Watch this.” He held an opaque thermos in one hand- _good, staying hydrated_ \- and reached into his pocket with the other, fumbling to find the plastic fangs he’d purchased. He placed them in his mouth, clicking them together twice to make sure they were on correctly, and jokingly said: “I _vant_ to suck your _blood!_ ”

Steve laughed, reaching into his own pocket to place his pipe in his mouth. He couldn’t do an impression of his own, but he thought it funny regardless that they seemed to be in such similar positions. Tony beamed at him as he removed the fangs once again.

He flipped the cap of his cup open and took a sip, closing it shortly afterward. Steve was so enamored by the redness of his lips that he didn’t even notice the scent that had wafted toward him until some seconds after the fact.

His face fell.

“Are you--” His nose scrunched up as he searched for the scent once more, but he couldn’t quite find it anymore. “Tony, are you alright?”

“Mm?”

“I thought I smelled-- Sorry, I thought… Blood.”

Tony quirked a brow, huffing out an awkward laugh. He shrugged as he idly fidgeted with his thermos. “Maybe someone’s on their period,” he said, after a moment. It was clearly intended to be a joke, but that seemed as good an explanation as any. It wasn’t like Steve could gauge details well at all, especially not from such a short moment of… possibly invasive sniffing.

_Sorry,_ he said in his mind, hoping that the sentiment would carry to whomever it was he might have gotten a tad bit too close to.

None of his business. If no one was screaming or calling for help, it was none of his business.

“You’re funny,” Tony said to him after a moment, snapping him out of his daze.

“I’m sorry?” 

“You’re just…” Glancing down thoughtfully at the checkerboard dance floor, Tony allowed his words to trail off into nothing.

It was a nice design choice, Steve thought. It looked expensive. It looked almost comically stereotypical.

“Do you want to take a break?” Tony asked, meeting Steve’s gaze once again.

“Oh, sure,” Steve replied. He was getting to the point where he would have taken one anyway. It was nice to have company.

Tony gave a curt nod, adjusting the cape so it rested more comfortably around his shoulders as he made his way out of the ballroom. He glanced over his shoulder every so often to watch for Steve. That tended to be their manner of checking in with each other during parties and galas and all sorts of crowded events; Tony would lead, Steve would listen for his shoes if he was lost in the crowd (as faces and heads and bodies blurred together sometimes, when he was especially overwhelmed), and Tony would check to make sure Steve heard.

The laughs and hollers became little more than a murmur once they’d exited the ballroom. It was a pleasant sort of thing to experience, almost akin to a lively child snoring softly on your lap or a unit of soldiers all far from the atrocities of war for a short while, laying together under the stars while a fire crackled beside them.

It was the love without the attention, Steve thought. It used to feel horribly isolating in the beginning, back before Steve had found where he belonged. But it became familiar as all things did with time, and if he listened closely, he could still pick out Jan’s pixie laughs and Sam’s squawks and Peter’s many mouths chattering away excitedly.

It was a nice enough feeling on his own, but with Tony beside him, it became all the more focused. It was as if Tony was a reverse prism through which the noises could filter themselves, all discordant in a beautiful way (in the same way Tony’s umbrella-cane was when he walked, in fact), but less so with Tony there.

It was the love without the attention, Steve thought. Except this time, it was all the love he could hope for centralized in the body of the one man whose attention he was lucky enough to hold for a few moments. He still couldn’t believe it, sometimes, when Tony turned his gaze onto him and held it there thoughtfully.

To think that Tony Stark _thought_ of him was, at times, more overwhelming than any party you could throw.

Steve thought of him in kind; his mind fluttered back to his hopeful fantasy of a sun-kissed Tony smiling in the day, but more realistically (and more seriously, he thought, as he loved no version of Tony more than the tangible one), the Tony who was always in the shade and covered head-to-toe in gorgeous thin fabrics, draping across his body weightlessly and gently.

That Tony- usually so sharp and so quick-witted- was a little bit off, it seemed.

“Tony,” Steve started, and he asked again: “Are you alright?”

Tony met his eyes, fidgeting once more with his cup. He held his gaze, and Steve was overwhelmed, wondering what Tony might be thinking, thinking of Tony in kind, and there they were as they were always intended to be.

“Steve,” Tony responded. He stopped fidgeting, stopped looking, and- very realistically- he might have even stopped thinking, because Steve couldn’t have imagined a contemplative and serious Tony saying the words he’d said next. “Would you like to come to bed with me?”

* * *

_Yes,_ was the answer, clearly.

They’d fallen into Tony’s plush, expensive bed together, tumbling downward in a mess of cheap fabrics and silly props, and they’d possibly been as excited and uncoordinated as they were when they were teenagers. Tony laughed, and Steve laughed with him, thinking his laugh to be the most recognizable and most gorgeous laugh of all with its low, rich timbre.

Tony undid Steve’s robe, and Steve thought to himself in a rather silly way: _If ever there were a time for me to be dressed like this…_

And perhaps Tony was even more funny in the moment, putting those plastic fangs back in his mouth for just a second to playfully say, “I _vant_ to suck your…” and fizzle out into laughter once more.

To say the least, it was sweeter than anything Steve could have expected. They fell together naturally once they’d been stripped of their costumes, Tony seating himself in Steve’s lap as if they were lock and key, made for one another. Steve groaned as he did so, hands coming to rest on Tony’s hips as Tony moved.

His hands went everywhere they could reach. When they brushed over the side of Tony’s neck, he found two marks- two puncture marks- and regarded them curiously.

_Part of the costume,_ Steve thought, though it was a fleeting thought. _The only part of the costume he put any effort into._

It may not have been the most logical conclusion to reach, in hindsight, but there were more important things to tend to.

They continued on like that for a while, for a small infinity, until their breaths came in shallowly and their hips twitched and they came together, Tony slumping over Steve’s shoulder with a breathless laugh.

They had a sweet few minutes together, tangled together like that- like one being- and then Tony slipped off of Steve, retreating to the bathroom to prepare for bed.

Steve hadn’t been kicked out- which he was grateful for- though, in hindsight, that fear of his was _also_ completely unsubstantiated, as Tony clearly wanted him around. When Tony reappeared from the bathroom a half an hour later, his hair was a little wet and his face was cleared of what Steve thought might have been a light coat of makeup (concealer, right? maybe concealer, as the dark circles under his eyes were more prominent than they had been a short while ago). He climbed into bed with Steve, his cold body curling up against Steve’s side. Steve turned to face him and, for a moment, looked past him at the large mirror fixed atop Tony’s dresser.

He saw his own face reflected back at him. No Tony to block the view.

_Probably a prank,_ he thought, sleepily, and he truly believed no one could blame him for the complete blank-mindedness (he’d love to be able to sugar-coat it for himself, but it was what it was) that came after a night with Tony Stark. _Probably a prank,_ he thought, alongside a million other, more pressing thoughts.

_He’s cold, still._ _  
_ _What can I do to warm him up?_

_I’m warm. I’ll hold him.  
_ _He’s got the comforter, here. I’ll fold it up. I’ll hold him. I’ll hold him._

_God, look at him.  
_ _He’s so beautiful. He’s so beautiful._

_He’s flawless._

And though Tony wasn’t tinkering or walking through the mansion, Steve could smell his scent in the room and hear his soft breaths, and he was lulled asleep once more.

Had he stayed awake for just a few more moments, he might have had the thought:

_The marks on his neck aren’t gone._

But he hadn’t.

* * *

He woke up alone in the bed but not in the bedroom. He was no longer holding Tony, but Tony was clearly in sight, sitting at his vanity with an assortment of makeup laid out in front of him. As he painted his foundation on, Steve could see the beginnings of a reflection appearing in the mirror, just a short bit above the collar of his shirt. Tony paused when Steve shifted, reaching into his drawer to slip in a pair of contacts. He blinked a few times, then looked back up, his eyes (a close approximation of them, at least) reflected in the mirror back at Steve, meeting his gaze.

Steve was still.

Tony tore his eyes away from Steve as he continued to apply his foundation, pulling it down his neck, then, and painting himself into reality.

_A work of art,_ Steve remembered thinking, once. _Lips red in a way that…_

There was a glass of wine beside the makeup collected onto one side of the vanity- what looked like wine, at least, but Steve registered the familiar scent after a moment, the scent that hit him hard almost every other day when he walked in on Tony having a drink. Tony took a sip, and the liquid inside was thicker than any wine would be.

Blood.

It was blood.

Steve knew before he knew. All the pieces were there, and he knew they had to fit together, but it took him some time to really _understand_ how they did.

It wasn’t until Tony had finished his morning routine by securing a wig to the top of his head (a wig that Steve hadn’t ever noticed until just then), and smiling at himself, satisfied. He stood, then, and he made his way back to bed with Steve. He fished a little digital camera out from the nightstand drawer and turned it around to point at the two of them.

“Hey, smile for me?” he asked. Steve did, a little awkwardly.

There was a flash, and Tony pulled the camera in, zooming in on his own face to make sure no part of himself had been left undone. He took a few moments to review the picture then, satisfied still, set the camera on the nightstand.

Those perfectly painted on lips were pressed to Steve’s for a moment, and Tony beamed his usual smile.

“How’d you sleep?” Tony asked.

“Well,” Steve responded. It was then that his eyes landed on the wounds on Tony’s neck- the wounds that were a part of his costume- and he had the thought he could have had the night prior if only he hadn’t had his mind properly blown.

_The marks on his neck aren’t gone._

“You’re a vampire,” he said.

Tony blinked, giving Steve that same funny look he gave the first time Steve ever said to him, _May I be invited in?_

And then, it seemed, pieces fell into place for Tony almost as much as they did for Steve.

“You didn’t know,” Tony responded.

“I didn’t know.”

“I wasn’t hiding it.”

“I can see that.”

“I thought I told you.”

“You might have.”

“And you forgot?”

“I don’t remember whether or not I forgot.”

“Is that alright?”

“Is what alright?”

“The fact that I am what I am. And we did what we just did.”

“I don’t think a werewolf can judge a vampire in this day and age, Tony,” Steve said simply, though he was still in a good bit of shock, and his words may have seemed more distant than he intended. “That’s archaic.”

Tony blinked again, eyes fixated on Steve’s face, his arms, his head, his chest, his-- well, his everything.

And Tony said to him, as shocked as Steve had felt just moments prior:

“You’re a werewolf.”


End file.
